A wide variety of rotary type engines and compressors are known in their respective arts. One reason for the development of rotary type engines is that in some respects they are more efficient than the well-known internal combustion engines which employ a plurality of pistons each disposed within a cylinder and connected to a crankshaft through a connecting rod. For instance, a great deal of heat and mechanical energy is wasted during the transfer of the linear, reciprocating motion of the piston to the rotating motion of the crank shaft.
A variety of rotary engines have been developed which employ sliding vanes mounted in slots in the rotor. One such rotary power device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,684,847 issued Feb. 3, 2004. The vanes are equally spaced about the rotor and divide the rotor chamber into discrete cavities. As the rotor returns, the vanes follow the wall contour of the motor chamber so that the cavities rotate with the rotor and expand and contract as the rotor turns. Each vane includes a vane plate portion, a pin fixable to the base of the vane and protruding through slots in the sides of the rotor, and cam follower rollers rotatably mounted at the outer ends of the pin and engaging guide cam grooves formed in side plates of the engine. As the rotor spins, the vanes reciprocate radially outward and inward relative to the rotor with the motion of the vanes being controlled by the cam grooves so that the vane tips come close to contacting the inner wall of a middle portion of the external stator.
Published PCT Patent Application No. WO 2007/062116 also describes a rotor having a number of radially extending slots in which movable vanes are mounted. The rotor is mounted in a chamber formed in an engine block. Movement of each vane is controlled by means of cam rollers mounted on opposite side edges of each vane. The cam rollers engage cam devices which have inner and outer tracks with smaller rollers on each vane engaging the outer track and larger rollers engaging the inner track. In this engine construction, there are also rollers mounted in the rotor to rollably support each vane as it moves in and out of its slot in the rotor.
Although the internal combustion engine illustrated and described in the aforementioned PCT application has a number of advantages over prior art designs and is efficient in its operation compared to known prior designs, the present applicants have improved this rotary engine design to provide a better cam and cam roller construction for controlling the radial movement of the vanes, to provide a rotor which is easier and less expensive to construct and which enables the efficient mounting of support rollers for the vanes, and in the case where auto ignition of fuel in the engine is desired, by providing a pressure transferring arrangement in the block in a location between combustion and compression chambers.